Saturday, March 9, 2013

Almost exactly seven years ago, I found myself in cuffs and on the wrong side of the war on drugs. I was in school, not quite old enough to drink, and not at all prone to exercising wise judgment. My bad habit of making bad choices ultimately led to a criminal conviction for possession of drug paraphernalia, and although a misdemeanor, the charge will never disappear. I used to raise a fuss over the fact one of the very ‘youthful indiscretions’ that our last three presidents have admitted to engaging in, has tarnished my permanent record and hampered my ability to find employment, even after years of not so much as a traffic ticket since the arrest occurred. Now, I count my blessings.

My record creates embarrassment and poses a few practical challenges, namely in job applications. However, when I was arrested, I was a white, middle-class college kid who was initially stopped for irresponsible conduct (in layperson’s terms: “acting a fool”). Most police stops in the war on drugs will occur because an individual is simply in the wrong place at the wrong time (in layperson’s terms: “fitting the profile”). Furthermore, while I find a lifelong blacklisting for a minor first offense unfairly harsh, it presents me with something tantamount to an inconvenience, rather than the kind of tragedies the war on drugs inflicts upon scores of other people. Had my charges been deemed felonious, and if my hired lawyer was instead a public defender, and if I was a person of color, my life would probably be very different today. It is not out of the question that, in addition to all but impossible hurdles to employment, I might also be forbidden to vote, ineligible for any kind of public assistance program, and subsequently ensnared in the inescapable cycle of recidivism and state-sponsored poverty that plagues thousands of citizens throughout our country.

If things had been more different still, I could also be facing some other burdens that the drug war inflicts upon our Latin American neighbors. I could have been a self-subsistent farmer, whose crops and livelihood were killed by the duster planes that indiscriminately destroy agricultural land in order to eradicate cocaine production. Again, that is if I was on the ‘lucky’ side of things in that part of the world, I could also have survived U.S.-backed paramilitary violence fueled by the war on drugs, only to see my family and loved ones assassinated.

“Staggering” barely encapsulates the impact of the now decades-old war on drugs. We’ve gathered some of the numbers: $1 trillion in U.S. taxpayer dollars has been spent so far on domestic enforcement alone since Nixon declared drugs “public enemy number one” in 1971, resulting in 45 million arrests and an incarceration rate that trumps China’s. We’ve heard the stories: black communities across the country decimated by the drug war’s racist tactics, violence by cartels abroad who thrive upon the unceasing demand for their product (in spite of the ever-increasing pressure from law enforcement), and addicts who cease to do so because they must battle their demons alone in cells rather than in treatment centers. The rules of time and space for blogs will never do justice for this issue because it is too large, too layered, and too rife with emotion.

With that in mind, the only germane point is, “What next?” At a recent policy dialogue in Durham, a panel of advocates and justice and law enforcement officials agreed that we have entered a new era in the U.S. when both conservatives and liberals now recognize that the the war on drugs is unstainable. At last, we have the opportunity—and the civic duty—to bring real life to this discussion. However, the mess we are in reached a critical juncture before yesterday, and we must confront some uncomfortable realities in order to clean it up so we can move forward.

First and foremost, we must address our preconceptions and stigmas against drug users. This has held us back for far too long, as we’ve been complacent to blame the problems caused by the war on drugs on those who lack “personal responsibility”. The days of peppering our language and arguments with prejudice-laced terms like “dope fiends”, “welfare queens”, and “thugs” need to desist as we examine the implications of drug addiction as a symptom rather than the cause of deeper societal flaws. Beyond this, we must also address drug abuse not as a criminal justice issue, but as one of public health. We must demand completely new legislation regarding the justice system’s handling of drug cases, i.e., sentencing disparities in crack versus powder cocaine sales. We must insist that our elected officials treat addiction as a mental health concern and use our tax dollars for better substance abuse treatment, instead of funneling them into a correctional system that is increasingly dominated by privatized prison industrial complexes that actually profit from draconian tough-on-crime policies. We must educate ourselves about the deleterious consequences of the U.S.’s war on drugs in other countries, and offer solidarity to our neighbors whose quality of life is under siege.

The tipping point for this unwinnable war is at hand. We are now looking down the barrel of over 40 years of failed policies and ruined lives. Do we really want to reach the 50-year mark and be forced to admit that, half a century later, there are no signs of changes for the better? The only way now to foresee any progress, slow though it will undoubtedly be, is to wave the white flag, declare that this war is lost, and concentrate all of our efforts on restoring the massive damages incurred, and into healing.

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This is your online resource for news, analysis, and action on U.S. foreign policy and corporate practice. You will also find stories of struggle and hope from our partners throughout Latin America.

Witness for Peace is a politically independent grassroots organization committed to nonviolence and led by faith and conscience. Witness for Peace's mission is to support peace, justice, and sustainable economies by changing the policies and practices which contribute to poverty and oppression in Latin America and the Caribbean.